Arsène Wenger believes Manchester United can exploit exhaustion among Barcelona players to secure the club's fourth European Cup at Wembley next week, with the Arsenal manager claiming the Catalans have been "on their knees" in recent weeks.

Wenger put aside his long-standing rivalry and invariably fractious relationship with Sir Alex Ferguson to insist the Scot is the only choice for manager of the year after regaining the Premier League title and leading his team to a third Champions League final in four seasons. The Frenchman suggested Ferguson would never have a better opportunity to defeat Barcelona on this stage and will have learned from the loss to Pep Guardiola's team in Rome in 2009 as he seeks to exploit United's physical superiority.

"I believe against Barcelona, on what I have seen in the last three weeks, there will never be a better moment maybe to win it against them," said Wenger. "They look quite exhausted and Manchester United look quite sharp physically in the last three or four games. For me it takes three weeks to recover physically, I'm not sure Barcelona will have had enough time. They looked on their knees so I would give United a good chance.

"It will be an advantage playing at Wembley. But you know Barcelona will have the ball for 70% of the time and United will have to be very efficient in the 30% of the time they will have the ball, no matter what kind of tactics they decide. I have an instinctive feeling United will change completely their style against them this time and go for a rougher midfield, a more direct display than they did in Rome.

"That can mean playing [Javier] Hernández still, but using him as a runner to go very direct. I don't know what they will decide, but that is basically the only uncertainty you have. You know how Barcelona will play. You don't know yet how United will play. But Ferguson is my manager of the season. They are in the Champions League final, they have won the championship. It can only be Ferguson."

Arsenal's season, once so promising, will peter out at Fulham on Sunday in the hope victory will see them leapfrog back over Manchester City into third place and avoid a potentially awkward qualifying tie for the Champions League. They will add to their squad in the summer, though Wenger intends to tweak rather than completely revamp his options. "We were not fighting against relegation," he said. "We have a good team, the best team away from home and we were top of the 'top four' league.

"The loss of the Carling Cup had a huge impact and we did not handle that well, but we have enough quality to beat anyone in the world, even with the current squad. You will have a Champions League final and only one team has beaten both teams who are in the Champions League final. Arsenal Football Club. We cannot think that, say, at Coventry we will find a player who will 'save' Arsenal. We have a good squad: we need to add of course and we will do, but we have a strong basis."